It’s hard to say for sure that the 16-million-square-foot plan isn’t entirely a publicity stunt. But Zhang has hired some of the engineers who worked on the current height-record holder, Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, and Broad has created two large models of “Sky City” (as the J220 has been nicknamed). The foundation is scheduled to be laid in November at a site in Hunan; if everything goes well, the building will be complete in March 2013.

That's a seven-month, or 210-day construction schedule, far longer than the 90-day period the company originally projected. Even so, it's practically light-speed when it comes to highrise construction; the Burj took five years to build, in comparison.

BSB plans to do the work quickly by using a proprietary prefabrication technique. It eventually hopes to sell standardized skyscrapers around the world and become the "McDonald’s of the sustainable building industry," writes Hilgers.